Pope Francis told it like it is and accused the EU of losing its way and of the “growing mistrust” of the EU citizens towards Brussels and its institutions (Image: Getty)

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One of the strangest stories to emerge in recent years was the murky tale of how the Irish Government tried to rig an Italian general election.

Can you believe it, a supposedly neutral country which refused to fight the Nazis, meddling in Italian politics so a right wing party would defeat the Communists?

While children were going hungry here, this State managed to come up with the equivalent of more than €2million [in today’s money] to try to fix an election in a foreign country.

Ireland’s “Italian Job” came about because the Church, which ran Ireland back then, feared the Commies would triumph in the 1948 Italian election.

Funny how a country that was comfortable with institutionalised paedophelia could be alarmed that youngsters’ minds might be corrupted by the writings of Karl Marx.

So the Irish Secret Service (bet you didn’t know we had one) became engaged in a hush-hush mission to deliver the cash to a shadowy group called Catholic Action in Italy.

The image of Seamus O’Bond in a trench coat travelling from a newly-liberated Ireland delivering bags of cash to a bishop in Rome to thwart the democratic progress is the stuff of Monty Python.

Then again Ireland is nothing if not the land of contradictions, where we launch Lenten campaigns to deliver clean water to Rwanda yet can’t supply it to homes in Roscommon.

And don’t we use our police to ensure the public can be metered for water while the same force is deployed protecting pipelines so our gas and oil can be given to foreign corporations for free?

There seems to be a deference gene in the DNA of Irish politicians which makes them do the bidding of almost anyone... apart from those who elected them.

Back in the 1940s the likes of Sean MacBride, who fought to throw off the yoke of British imperialism and who was involved in the Italian Job, were totally subservient to the Church.

On becoming Minister for External Affairs his first action was to send a telegram to Rome offering to “repose at the feet” of the Pope.

A rough translation reads: “How best should I kiss your butt, your holiness?”

How times have changed and this week the current Pope went to Strasbourg and kicked the asses of the elites who have turned the EU into the European Economic Empire.

Pope Francis told it like it is and accused the EU of losing its way and of the “growing mistrust” of the EU citizens towards Brussels and its institutions.

The Pontiff said: “To our dismay we see technical and economic questions dominating political debate, to the detriment of genuine concern for human beings.” Tell us about it.

He could well have been talking about a certain Coalition whose aim appears to be to drive down State debt, much of it not ours, even if it means driving families into the ground.

He also hit out at unemployment, especially among the young, which is running at up to 50% in some countries, as well as labour rights and immigration.

“Above all there is a need to restore dignity to labour by ensuring proper working conditions,” he said. Obviously Francis has heard of JobBridge.

I’m sure that putting young ambitious graduates behind deli counters on so-called work experience schemes for €50 a week would be covered there.

The pontiff’s claim people “risk being reduced to mere cogs in a machine that treats them as items of consumption to be exploited” will hit a chord with those being forced to pay for their water...TWICE.

What Pope Francis was saying is that ours and other governments have lost their way and are looking after the interests of economies and not in people and societies.

When this State can pump tens of billions into banks yet can’t find cash to properly fund health and education while thousands face eviction from their homes, you’d have to say Francis is not far off the mark.

Should Sean MacBride come back from the grave he might be confused to see an Irish Government embracing the religion of austerity coming from secular Brussels while ignoring the communist teachings coming from Rome.

Ireland: Land of missed opportunity?

US President Barack Obama (Image: AFP)

How come people from outside the EU living here without visas are illegal immigrants while Irish people in a similar position in the US are undocumented? Just askin’.

President Obama put his neck on the block by signing an executive order authorising work permits for over five million ‘illegals’ including thousands of Irish.

Without a blush, the Taoiseach urged the President to be “open and flexible” on travel for undocumented Irish in the US.

The Migrant Rights Centre made a similar call to our Government to regularise the 20,000 or so “illegals” living here.

The Department of Justice has now ruled that a scheme similar to the one introduced by President Obama is not on the cards.